Brian- the Las Vegas Strip at midnight
Theresa- the Grand Canyon at noon

Driving into Las Vegas at 10:00pm in 100 degree heat

Miles Traveled Today

Total Miles Traveled

Miles Theresa Drove

Weather

435

13,853

201
(3261 total)

Hot, yet dry

Price of Gas
(average per gallon)

Wildlife

Night's Lodging

Where this Page was Uploaded

1.63

Scorpions and rattlesnakes

Circus Circus Circusland
Las Vegas, NV

Alan & Michelle's
Newberg, OR

Daily Narrative
It was a day of contrasts, from the Arizona desert, to the touristy and
attractive Grand Canyon, on to the touristy and bizarre Las Vegas strip.
We woke in a heavily wooded (for the area) campsite in the Homolovi Ruins
State Park, just outside of Winslow, AZ. We started early, at about
6:00am, to beat the heat and get to the relatively higher elevations of
the Grand Canyon. The weather forecast for the desert floor was in
the 110 degree range, while the forecast for the Grand Canyon southern
rim was in the mid eighties. The tricky piece of planning was in
not coming down off of the Grand Canyon rim and heading west too early.
We had plotted out a course that would get us to the west coast before
"scorching" (to quote the weather section of the newspaper) heat engulfed
the Mohave Desert tomorrow, but it involved us getting to Las Vegas tonight.
Okay, Vegas was an extra hour of driving, but it would be a shame to miss
such a natural treasure when we were so close. Better yet, we found
Circusland, Circus Circus' RV campground right on the Las Vegas Strip for
$20 a night. We assumed the worst. Anyway, off to the Grand
Canyon at 6:00... We crawled up the southern rim from the eastern
entrance and stopped first at Desert View, then at the Tusayan Ruins, and
then at the Grand Canyon Village tourist corral. On the whole, it
was what Brian remembers from ten or so years earlier, very pretty, very
big, and very crowded. Staying almost four hours, we also eclipsed
Brian's previous record by almost three and a half hours. Trying
not to hit the desert floor too long before things began to cool, we hit
an IMAX movie on the Grand Canyon (also very pretty and very big, but not
so crowded) and a cafe on the way down. Turns out there was no real
way to beat the heat, as the further west we drove the hotter it got.
It was getting dark and hotter at the same time. We stumbled across
Hoover Dam around 10:00pm (who knew they kept it right outside of Las Vegas?)
and the temperatures were still around 100 degrees. We checked into
our asphalt campground in the figurative shadow of Circus Circus around
10:30 and prepared to explore the Las Vegas strip. Brian had actually
suffered a little time zone confusion and thought it was 9:30. We
spent two or three hours doing the "Oh! I've seen that." thing and marveling
at all of the neon with the throng of tourists marching up an down Las
Vegas Boulevard, before hitting the very warm hay at around 2:00am.
The low for the night is forecast at 85 degrees.

Daily Pictures

The bus sporting the "fauxdobe" look in our heavily wooded site
at Homolovi Ruins State Park

Regulation number eight raised some concerns with Theresa

Don't worry about us...

The climb from the desert into the Grand Canyon begins

The eastern end of the Grand Canyon Park, Desert View

A view up at the Desert View tower ceiling

Spokesmodels don't appear to have anything to worry about

Yep, it's really big and pretty. We'd recommend it

Looking down at the Colorado River

The Tuyasan Ruins

Brian test drives some back up transportation

Theresa works on a Katchina Doll lesson for next year

We both appreciated the integration of technology into a relatively
limited menu

Ever the savvy travelers, we were pleasantly surprised to stumble
upon the incredible Hoover dam just outside of Las Vegas

Or just a big cheesy casino...

This we are sorry we missed

Welcome home Mr. Las Vegas! To quote the billboards, that
is...

Another place we'd heard of

Our favorite choice of casinos went to Treasure Island, because
of the cool props

Sigfreid and Roy Plaza, spooky isn't it?

Click on the picture for a much better spokesmodel and a pretty
panorama